About Me

My current gig
I founded Clear Indexes in 2007 as a wholly owned subsidiary of Clear Asset Management Inc which I began in 2004. Clear Indexes focuses on the creation and publication of custom indexes. Many of the indexes utilize a subset of the multifactor models we developed for Clear Asset Management that have blown away their benchmarks over their 3.5 years of equities management. We develop custom benchmarks for institutions. Mostly Clear Indexes designs innovative indexes for products that are, scalable, and positioned to outperform the market. Three ETFs are already available tracking our indexes including the Clear Global Timber Index tracked by (CUT) - with more to come based on Clear Indexes methodology.

The parent company, Clear Asset Management, a multi-style equity manager, was founded in 2004 with the desire to demystify quantitative investing, provide complete transparency creating a new level of communications with our clients. Our investment process is driven by our proprietary multifactor models. These were developed by combining academic research, best practices in investment management, and reverse engineering of the holdings of several highly successful value and growth investors.

After working in and around managers for years, I wanted Clear to provide institutions, intermediaries, and individuals clarity in the investment process and innovative approaches to investment styles.

I spent the previous two years as SVP at TheStreet.com beginning my work there on Independent Research Group its now defunct broker-dealer. We had a good time at TheStreet.com, achieving profitability for the first time. There was a magical team there and I am close with several people.

For the 20 previous years I trained for this industry and blogging writing and designing analyst presentations, IPO road shows, designing asset allocation programs and working for brokers, asset managers, exchanges, public companies and the various financially focused firms that service them. I owned and ran Admaster Communication and Master Approach as well as angel investing in a software firm and custom publisher. It was a great if unorthodox training for what I do today.

The ride continues.

Why Blog?
I founded Clear with the mission that our clients would know how their money is invested, exactly what stocks they own, and why each stock was selected for their portfolio.

I like to make the analogy to healthcare. Who goes to see a doctor and doesn’t ask a hundred questions? What is in that prescription? How does it work? Why exactly do I need it? What are the side effects and risks? After our health, investing money seems to be high on most people’s list of what is important to them. In my opinion, in parallel to the healthcare industry, so will financial services de-mystify.

To keep our clients further informed, for the past two years I have been writing weekly commentary on the events that impact the market and consequentially, our clients. These thoughts have been posted on the company’s password protected website. After researching the blogosphere, I decided to expand this commentary and write on many additional topics in a blog. I hope to also engage in a meaningful dialogue. I enjoy the criticism when I’m wrong and being ignored by readers and syndicators when I am right.